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George zips ahead but his young friends will pay

At the best of times, political projections of what will happen in the economy
in three or four years are a cocktail of fantasy, bravado and simple
arithmetic, with maybe a dash of scepticism. But these are not the best of
times for the coalition or anyone else. For sure, the Conservatives are
quietly suggesting that they must be doing something right, now that today’s
poll slashes Labour’s lead to its lowest in more than a year and the Office
for National Statistics has wiped away the stain of a double-dip recession
because growth froze at zero in the first three months of 2012.

Sound the trumpets — there are shards of light in the economic doom! It was
certainly high-grade political legerdemain by George Osborne that made his
party’s standing move up after a statement promising further austerity
through and beyond the 2015 general election.